IPPR Rural Housing Policy Report

Hastoe has joint-funded a new piece of research on affordable rural housing, with a blueprint for Government on how to fix the rural housing crisis.

A new report, reveals scale of affordable housing challenge
in the English countryside.

Rural communities need a new deal to deliver more affordable homes, as a new report from the IPPR, highlights the scale of the affordable
housing crisis in the English countryside. The research, released on the first day of Rural Housing Week 2018, finds:

The average rural house price of £320,700 is more than £87,000
higher than the urban average excluding London (£233,600)

Rural housing is less affordable to local people than in most
urban areas. A family with one child, earning one full-time and one part-time
median wage in a mainly or largely rural area would spend 31 per cent of their
income on rent, compared to 26 per cent or 19 per cent in most urban local
authorities.

Between 2014 and 2038, the working age population in rural areas is projected to decline by 75,000 people while the population aged over 65 will grow by around 1.5 million.

-.T The report calls for a new deal for
rural communities on affordable housing which would ensure that the English
countryside isn’t just able to survive but thrive. It recomends:

A
new deal for rural communities. Local and combined authorities should
enter into two-way negotiations with central government to develop devolution
deals for rural areas. These deals could include:

a commitment to devolving funding for
affordable housing

devolved powers over council tax to
help tackle the problem of holiday and second homes

the
discretion to repeal, suspend or reform the statutory Right to Buy policy in
their areas

A rural
community house building programme: The
government should task and support Homes England with embarking on a significant
Rural House Building Programme. Including

a rural affordable housing target for grant allocation

developing a specific rural grant to be administered by
Homes England

the development of a rural living rent, based on local
earnings at a sub-local authority level, to truly connect local earnings with
rents.

Planning for new homes in rural communities: Land needs
to be brought forward where it is needed at a price that means it can be developed
for affordable housing. Measures should include:

setting an
‘upfront’ target in local plans for affordable housing including on sites of
less than 10 units.

reform of
planning policy to explicitly exempt rural areas from changes to the section
106 requirements which no longer require affordable housing commitments on
sites of less than 10

ensure
that restrictions on Entry Level Exception sites as proposed in the draft NPPF
are restricted for use only in urban areas if they come to fruition

where a
local plan does not set an upfront target, place a default 35 per cent target
for affordable housing delivery on all sites, including those of less than 10,
and 50 per cent on public land

reform the
viability process in the NPPF to ensure that rural areas are not missing out on
a supply of affordable housing in line with the recommendations made by Shelter
and the CPRE in their report Viable
Villages.

Darren Baxter,
Research Fellow at IPPR said:

“The high cost of housing in rural areas poses a threat to rural
life. Without somewhere affordable to live young people will leave the
countryside, services will close and villages will die out.

“An ambitious programme of rural house building could not only
have benefits for individuals, but could benefit wider communities, halting the
decline in rural life.”

Luke
Murphy, Associate Director at IPPR said:

“A lack of
affordable housing is often only seen as an urban problem, but it is a critical
issue in rural areas too where housing is less affordable than in most towns
and cities.

“At the heart of this crisis is a huge shortage of affordable
homes and the failure of successive governments to develop policies which meet
the needs of rural areas.

“We are calling for a new deal on housing for rural communities
which must include a new rural affordable homes programme, reform of the
planning process to allow for the provision of affordable homes in villages and
a commitment to put the needs of rural areas at the heart of government
policymaking.”

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